Ratings, new and improved.

• Author: Douglas, Susan
• Position: Humor - TV-ratings system - Pundit Watch - Column

Have you been enjoying the debate about the new television-ratings system? Shows will have labels like T.V.-Y and T.V.-G (both of which, it appears, mean virtually the same thing), and preliminary polling and focus groups indicate that parents find these labels pretty useless.

Does T.V.-7 mean that the program in question doesn't have "frontal nudity" but does show Steven Seagal kung fuming ten guys to pieces? Children's advocacy groups insist no one can tell and that the system needs to be more specific, alerting parents as to whether the program is violent, sexually explicit, laced with profanity, or all of the above.

Jack Valenti, Il Duce of the Motion Picture Association of America, has responded thoughtfully to these concerns by saying, "I can certify to you right now we will not use any other T.V.-ratings guidelines," and that efforts to impose another system will be met by a lawsuit "in a nanosecond." But then again, Valenti has always insisted that vulgar, violent, sex-crazed programming is Hollywood's way of celebrating the First Amendment, and that keeping televisual swill away from children is the parent's responsibility.

I, too, have problems with the proposed ratings system: It doesn't cover enough. So much of what is truly "depraved"--to borrow from Bob Dole--about television is simply left out. So I am faxing my own suggestions and emendations to Valenti forthwith. Here they are.

PN-46: Posterior Nudity 46. Forget frontal nudity. If I have to see Jimmy Smits's or Dennis Franz's butt on NYPD Blue, I want ample warning. This label could also be used for The McLaughlin Group, where the horse's ass is the norm.

SSNA-14: Self-Serving Network Amnesia 14. This designation should be on all programming that disguises the increasingly incestuous relationship between corporate America and the news media, and that seeks to eradicate from recent memory examples of newsroom cowardice.

Such a label would have come in handy during a recent episode of Prime Time Live entitled "The Hand That Feeds." This "expose" by ABC News revealed that businesses--especially car dealerships--that advertise on local T.V. stations have used their financial muscle to mute or kill investigative reports. In some instances, the dealers have organized boycotts of a local station, withdrawing all their advertising revenue until the station promises to investigate local car dealerships no more.

Now I was enjoying this story, but then Chris Wallace gave the sign-off...